the only guarantee any country can have of sovereignty, for some decades now, is nuclear capacity

I agree - every two-bit, four-bit or eight-bit nation state must pursue a nuclear program regardless of the cost in terms of international trade of humanitarian aid. The sovereignty of Canada, Australia, Mexico, Japan, Brazil and the rest of South America, most of Africa, all the Scandinavian countries and southern Europe, and Switzerland have been teetering daily on the brink for decades. How is it that these non-nuclear nations [wikipedia.org] have not yet been annexed by the nuclear powers and overrun with McDonalds [mcdonalds.com] drive-throughs or Trabant [time.com] factories? Or maybe bagel shops [einsteinbros.com] instead?

You are aware that the US has active invasion plans for The Netherlands? It is home to the internation court in The Hague and the US has plans to invade a friendly nation if ever a US citizen goes on trial for war crimes.

So... what was your point again? The US does not even respect sovereign nations that have been friendly for centuries.

You are aware that the US has active invasion plans for The Netherlands?

The Pentagon draws up contingency plans for pretty much every conceivable situation. One of the categorizations when it comes to things military is capabilities vs. intentions. It's the job of the generals think about capabilities and to have a plan ready if a president ever orders them to do something. Whether a president is ever likely to order them to do so, or whether or not a given country is ever likely to become hostile to the US falls under "intentions" and isn't something they're supposed to consider. There were plans for wars against Germany, Japan, France, Britain, and others as early as 1904. There was a sub-plan for a US invasion of Canada, and the Canadians likewise had a plan for invading the US. I'm sure that, for example, the generals in both the British and French defense ministries have plans ready if, some day, the leader across the channel goes nuts -- yet France and Britain have been each others' allies for over a century. (Not counting the Vichy as French for these purposes).

You'd be a fool to think that the Pentagon draws up contingencies just for the sake of it, w/o intentions of really doing it.

I'm not a fool, thank you very much, but that's exactly what they do. When country X does Y, and the president asks the generals what his options are, they're not supposed to respond with "Sorry, Mr. President, we never thought country X would do Y." Generals deal with "what can country X do, and what can we do to country X." Diplomats deal with "what will country X do, and what do we want to do to country X."

How frequently do those apparently sovereign countries act in ways that benefit the United States (and its controlling corporations) and that harm their own national interests? I don't know the answer in overall terms, but there are certainly a large number of instances that range from the U.S.-imposed War on Non-Corporate Drugs in Mexico, to kidnappings and deaths in Italy, to U.S. military bases in Japan, where those governments are doing the bidding of the United States and instead of their own citizens.

On the contrary, nukes raise the expected cost of any military action significantly. US would accrue huge negatives even if it was only perceived to have provoked NK to use one of their own. Besides, it is unlikely the US will use military force without approval from at least SK and Japan, which isn't happening in the next decade. In 10 years from now things may well be different, as both Japan and SK seem to be growing hawkish, but even such developments are far from certain, as the stances of both SK and Japan will depend much more on the position of China then.

A US leader will find it much, much harder to cobble up a "coalition of the willing" against anyone in Asia similar to the one W whipped up in Eastern Europe for the Eye-rack invasion.

On the contrary, nukes raise the expected cost of any military action significantly. US would accrue huge negatives even if it was only perceived to have provoked NK to use one of their own.

If you have a large store of functioning ICBMs and the enemy to be stopped from attacking is a democracy, then maybe.

NK wouldn't hold out in a military conflict for more than a few days against a well-prepared US attack. All NK might -might- be able to do with it's nukes is take out a few hundred soldiers. That is assuming the US even uses soldiers on the ground, as nukes are useless against air targets, and they're less than optimally effective in water as well (it is amazing how much energy even modest amounts of water can absorb by vaporizing. Absolutely unbelievable).

It has actually been tested that an atomic explosion more than 200 meters away from an aircraft carrier, while it would kill anyone on in line of sight from the explosion, wouldn't sink the ship (tested on a model, not with an actual aircraft carrier).

The only defense NK has, or needs, is China as an ally, because with that ally comes escalation risk. The US does not just depend on it's own military security. The US, like any well-connected modern nation built on international trade, would be vastly damaged by any large scale conflict. The US would likely be less hurt by a NK-US military conflict than by a NK-SK conflict. A China vs middle east or China vas Africa or, God forbid, China vs Europe conflict would make economic conditions inside the US worse than they were in 1900 in a matter of months, a year at the most. Google, Microsoft, General Electric, Texaco, Chevron would all be cut in 100 pieces, unable to communicate amongst themselves, unable to ship goods from one place to another, unable to interconnect their networks. The internet age would be over 2 days into the conflict, never to return (in case you don't believe that, the telephone system, interconnected in the exact same way as the internet is today, failed in 90%+ of Europe about 9 days into world-war 2. In france it failed just before the invasion started. While not as automatically resilient as the internet, the reason the telephone network failed was not that rerouting failed. The reason for the failure was that every line was cut, and there was no way to reroute).

NK probably doesn't see this. Internally the state is completely dependant on constant violence and threats from top-down, so that's how they deal with the outside world.

You display a massive misunderstanding of the military position of the US and the rest of the world. The US does not have the need to concern itself with internal security much, it is spending most of it's resources guaranteeing security outside of it's borders, since that's where the US is vulnerable. Supply lines are what wins wars. All US supply lines, from oil to iPads, lie outside of it's borders. This makes the US much more vulnerable than it would seem to be at first. The US must not just avoid getting into a conflict itself, it must prevent ANY 2 governments from getting into a real fight, worldwide (except maybe - maybe - in Africa). This is why the US nearly always stands down the first chance it gets, and militarily intervenes only where there is risk of escalation.

"the US" or "the West", you and me are included in that. You and I would be effectively fired (without a wage) a week after a large international conflict started, no matter where or who the fighting parties are.

NK wouldn't hold out in a military conflict for more than a few days against a well-prepared US attack.

Agreed.

All NK might -might- be able to do with it's nukes is take out a few hundred soldiers.

Disagree.

Please observe that NK developed both Nuclear weapons and orbital capability, a combination that permits a hypothetical EMP attack. This type of attack against the continental United States has significantly higher indirect casualty estimates. The lowest estimate I've seen is 10% of the population. If this isn't a major component of NK's nuclear deterrent plan, then they need to hire new strategists.

That is assuming the US even uses soldiers on the ground, as nukes are useless against air targets, and they're less than optimally effective in water as well (it is amazing how much energy even modest amounts of water can absorb by vaporizing. Absolutely unbelievable).

It has actually been tested that an atomic explosion more than 200 meters away from an aircraft carrier, while it would kill anyone on in line of sight from the explosion, wouldn't sink the ship (tested on a model, not with an actual aircraft carrier).

Actually tests have been made, such as Operation Crossroads, Baker event [youtu.be]and not against models, but real full sized ships and the Lexington-class air craft carrier, the USS Saratoga (CV-3) [wikipedia.org] did in fact sink from damage caused by the the underwater baker detonation, 8 hours later [wikipedia.org].
Also you greatly under-estimate the effect of a nuclear explosion on aircraft, both EMP and blast waves have devastating effect on the airframes and electronics, even hardened military grade electronics; and the fleshies insi

sounds more like the real worry is that if the US pisses NK off enough, NK may actually have the balls (and a sufficient lack of concern for self-preservation) to unleash cans of nuclear whoop ass across the pacific.

the reason why this could become a real possibility is that the NK leadership would all be hiding in their nuclear-proof bunkers and would likely not give a rats about its citizens on the surface, so the traditional concept of MAD wouldn't apply to NK

Destruction of Seoul is probably more likely from conventional weapons than from nuclear weapons. There's a good chance the North hasn't figured out a delivery system for nukes, but they can definitely shell damage and terror from their many guns along the border.

I've always thought the threat was more along the lines of what would happen to the half-dozen or more N. Korean nuclear weapons, should the regime collapse. In the chaos it would be easy to lose track of them.

Alternatively, the N. Koreans could use the same delivery system for nukes they've used for drugs and counterfeit currency in the past: stick them on a freighter and sail them right into the harbor of their target.

China would never intervene if NK decided to send a nuclear missile against US. It will just watch how the situation develops while eating some popcorn.

Why would China do anything besides that? At most they may give some statement... but they would be crazy to do anything else besides assist the US (which is unlikely unless they themselves feel threatened).

There is absolutely no need for anyone in the rest of the world to intervene in the event of an official NK attack on US, particularly nuclear... it would be a de facto declaration of war and NK would be completely obliterated within days... any areas left habitable would be occupied by US forces within

Any dissent is punished by 3 generations of imprisonment in a remote work camp (that means you and your next two generations of children grow up with lifetime jail sentences if you are a dissenter, and yes, you get conjugal visits just to create additional generations to punish, but they also are brainwashed with loyalty just like other children).

The real threat N. Korea poses (even beyond the ability level Seoul with artillery and set a couple of low-tech nukes loose) to both China and S. Korea (and arguably Japan as well) is the humanitarian disaster that would result from a rapid collapse. Integrating East Germany into West Germany cost an estimated two trillon euros. And East Germany was functional and much closer to West Germany in terms of infrastructure than North Korea is to South Korea. North Korea has half-again as many people as East Germany did, while South Korea has only about 80% of West Germany's population. A disintegrating N. Korea would be a complete nightmare for everyone in the region.

That depends. East German top officials saw their country as a product of post ww2 Russia - as in a Russian 'prize', something to be protected and cared for at any cost by Russia. I recall reading some top staff members made a long glowing toast about the unique relationship. The Russians in the room changed the wording just a bit - the more wise in the relaxed room setting understood the meaning - they where not special.
China likes China and what was part of China. NK is more a pool of intel, cheap ex

Incorrect. Without the capability to protect an ICBM during the boost phase of the flight, it's vulnerable to attack by an enemy who can establish air superiority over the launch areas. As far as we know, North Korea lacks both SLBMs and long range strategic bombers which means they cannot establish the nuclear triad [wikipedia.org]. In fact, the existence of North Korean nuclear weapons, with neither first [wikipedia.org] nor second strike [wikipedia.org] capability, increases the likelihood that they will be attacked preemptively in the future. The mere possession of nuclear weapons is not enough. A nation must also posses the capability to launch a surprise attack and to guarantee retaliation in the event of a surprise attack. Thus, the only nations with a complete and credible deterrent at this time are the United States and Russia.

Lets phrase this properly, shall we. NK uses the threat of nuking SK and Japan and the prospect of millions of refugees flooding into China to keep China compliant, the US at bay and everyone giving one of the most tyrannical and inept regimes in existence the food and other humanitarian supplies its pathetic and abused citizens need to survive because it has redirected most of its economic output to its insanely disproportionate military machine.

without Stalin the whole world would be speaking German and saluting Nazi flags... plenty of people outside the US would say that the US is governed by one of the most tyrannical regimes in history, and it has nothing to do with the President or Congress, which would be seen as mere puppets for the corporate lobbyists who fund and manipulate all levels of the US government for their own greedy purpose

And if the US had not instituted Lend Lease to bolster Russian production and Britain had not redirected some of the Arctic Convoys to Russian ports, Stalin would have been running Russia from east of the Urals. And if Stalin had not liquidated the larger portion of the Red Army's officer corp and had not still allowed steel shipments to Germany right up until the morning of the German invasion, it would be far less likely that Germany would have enjoyed such extraordinary successes early on.

Rubbish - they have no need of nukes or ballistic missiles, with their conventional forces they could still be in Seoul pretty fast; it's about 30 miles from the boarder.That's more than 10 million people within artilliary range...

I see no reason why any country should bow to pressure to stop developing weaponry.

For one thing, it speaks to the sovereignty of the nation in question in the most basic way possible. Weapons can be used to protect citizens from the overbearing dictates of another country. Open yourself to unbridled foreign dictates and they could sack your country. See Danegeld [wikipedia.org].

For another, as pointed out regularly here on Slashdot, weapons don't kill people - people kill people. If you can argue that the problem is the weapon and not the people (and their interactions), then you're starting down the slippery slope of intercession, pre-emptive war, and so on. Where do you draw the line? Can you dictate to stop other behaviours that don't affect you directly, but that you don't like? Drug farming? Copyright infringement? Smoking? Stem cell research?

And finally, the general feel here on Slashdot is that places like Iran, NK, et al should not be allowed to have weapons because they would probably use them.As others have pointed out, as soon as a country gets nuclear capability the US stops meddling and takes a more respective stance (viz: India, Pakistan). At the same time we decry US policies that anger other countries and make the world our enemy. If Iran has nuclear capability, it will cause our government to step back from imperialist meddling.

NK should be free to develop whatever they want in whatever form they want. It is only when they start affecting the people of other nations that remedial measures should be taken.

And yes - this may mean that a tragic incident happens followed by overwhelming response. This scenario will be better in the long run than leaving things to fester unaddressed. The stark aftermath of the Japan [nuclear] bombing caused the world to be more cautious and circumspect. Had the US *not* bombed Japan, the first nuclear exchange (in the cold war) would have been with improved technology and better delivery vehicles. Much, much worse.

Let them develop whatever they want. There is no upside to us being a bully.

NK and Iran are both free to develop whatever weapons they want, but obviously other countries are also free not to support them or actively try to prevent them getting hold of the materials and technology required.

NK, for example, is dependent on food aid to feed its people. They are free to develop long range ICBMs, but can't reasonably expect the food aid to keep coming if they do. They can expect other countries to point their missiles at them and keep their fingers hovering over the launch buttons.

Welcome to the world. We all have to live in it and you can't expect to just do what you like without consequences. But, yeah, I do agree that there should be no pre-emptive military action or anything like that.

It is the only thing that protects them from the wrath of US army... ever wondered why the US only attack weak countries?

You do realize that when the US liberated Kuwait in the '90's, that Iraq had the fourth largest military in the world, don't you? This military was not only large, but battle hardened after fighting Iran for years. That kind of blows a whole in your whole " the US only attack weak countries" theory, doesn't it?

Battle-weary might have been a better description. Army strength is not measured only by size, as evidenced by the conscripts who surrendered in waves during Bush the Elder's Iraq war. You also have a funny definition of "liberate". While Saddam was certainly no prize as a head of state, I certainly wouldn't want to be "liberated" back into the rule of an autocratic abusive monarchy.

No one wants to attack or invade North Korea. Taking out the government means taking care of the people, and somewhere in there that would mean a lot of unskilled immigrants that South Korea can't support economically. It would make no sense. The rest of the world is much more interested in pressuring the DPRK into reform, so it can take care of its citizens on its own. No one knows how to actually do that, but they certainly have no interest in anything else, other than preventing the country from harming its neighbours.

The same situation happened with German unification. WG undertook a massive (Trillion $$$ +) programme of investment in the former East Germany and I expect that S. Korea will, some day, do the same with the north. The great thing about these sorts of programmes is that they really ARE investment programmes, not aid or just costs. The investment pays back when the newly unified country creates masses of extra jobs doing the reconstruction, installing infrastructure and then making better use of the newly ac

That is not what the GP meant. There is nobody stronger than US. US attacks only those that do not present any significant threat, because doing otherwise would risk damage. It is not an unreasonable strategy but maybe not attacking anybody and minding its own business would be a better one, considering that it greatly stimulates countries to go nuclear to guarantee sovereignty.

And if we discount the US is the big bad bully of the world; how about addressing the Mumbai terrorist attack? India is a nuclear power, but that didn't stop Pakistani terrorists from attacking. Or the countless IRA bombings of England? England is a nuclear power but that didn't stop Irish nationalists from attacking. Or the Beslan school hostage crisis of Russia? Russia is a nuclear power, but that didn't stop Chechen separatists from attacking.

The fact that you cite SPECIFICALLY the US just goes to show how pitifully delusional your argument is. Nuclear proliferation doesn't solve anything unless the political structure is in place to restrain military escalation. "Most" Western countries have that restraint, as demonstrated during the Cold War. But some countries don't (how nuclear proliferation working out for your Pakistan/India?)

Except that you didn't really. Propaganda and attempts to retroactively edit out history, cannot not change actual history. Let us observe the chain of events.

1. May 1939, USA, under Roosevelt, informs Japan that it is withdrawing from the 1911 Treaty of Commerce(Japan was highly dependent on USA for oil etc). Japan goes ahead with its conquest plans anyways.
2. July 1940, United States/Roosevelt imposed an embargo on aviation gasoline and high-grade scrap iron to Japan. Japan looks for alternative sources.
3. United States responds with a complete embargo on scrap iron. Japan announces the Axis Pact next day.
4. The United States extends the embargo to tools, iron, steel, copper, bronze, and many other critical metals.
5. Roosevelt orders freezing all Japanese assets in the United States.
6. Cut from critical resources, Japan tries negotiating with United States. After those failed, Japan declared war.

Your definition of sitting it out(while waging full blown economic warfare) is pretty different from rest of the world. I am not commenting on whether Japan needed to be stopped and how evil they were, and how they were killing babies and barbequing them and eating them raw even etc. etc. But Roosevelt was NOT sitting this one out.

World War 2 was not the glorious battle between "good and evil". It was two equally evil, bloodthirsty colonial powers duking it out. For the Nazi Holocaust, we have an quietly ignored Indian Holocaust (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_Rebellion_of_1857#Aftermath) that saw British killing millions of Indians in direct reprisals. Add another 10 million or so, if you count the ones who died due to the famines caused by apathetic exploitative British rule. I think Jew holocaust casualties, high as they were, pale in contrast. But since history books are written by the victors, even though the figures were pretty much recorded, they are usually always ignored, else things like Jalianwala bagh massacre and 1857 massacres would make british much much more evil in terms of body count.

In the end, USA took sides, and was already participating in economic warfare against one of the sides. Truly staying neutral would have meant embargoing both sides(Britain for steel and Japan/Germany for oil) while the war was on, which would have crippled both sides and resulted in perhaps lesser carnage.

Excellent post. Along similar lines, it's a little odd to consider how cheerfully we celebrate WWII as a "victory" while ignoring inconvenient little bits, like how the war in the European theater started with the invasion and conquest of Poland... and ended with Poland invaded and conquered. By our supposed ally, Russia, which was one of the two countries that invaded it in the first place.

I believe you haven't really catch the point about the Holocaust. Even if the British killed millions of Indians, their intent wasn't to kill all the Indians because they believed they were evil. That's not something you just compare by body count. That's the difference between a genocide and a war, civil war, revolt, riot or whatever. The plan behind the Holocaust was to withdraw completely the Jews from the Earth. That's why some caution should be taken when doing some comparisons.

The Nazis weren't killing Jews in direct reprisals of something. They were killing them because they believe they have no right to live.

Spoken truly like someone who has absolutely no clue regards attitude of many Britishers of the time had towards Indians.

Let us see:
Charles Dickens: "I wish I were commander-in-chief in India... I should proclaim to them that I considered my holding that appointment by the leave of God, to mean that I should do my utmost to exterminate the race."

Winston Churchill : "I hate Indians. They are a beastly people with a beastly religion."

General Dyer on his Jalianwalanbagh Massacre "I would have killed more Indians, if more ammunition had been available".

The actual nearest things to commander-in-chief of India during these periods, were not so different either:
Lord Lytton, the governing British viceroy in India during 1877–79 famine(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Famine_in_India#British_response):
Reacting against calls for relief during the 1877–79 famine, Lytton replied, "Let the British public foot the bill for its 'cheap sentiment,' if it wished to save life at a cost that would bankrupt India," substantively ordering "there is to be no interference of any kind on the part of Government with the object of reducing the price of food," and instructing district officers to "discourage relief works in every possible way.... Mere distress is not a sufficient reason for opening a relief work."

Intentionally destroying food crops, so that British cloth factories can get their dyes, even if it meant a famine, how is that so different? At least Hitler had some justification and a personal grudge in his mind. But intentionally starving millions, just because you believe they were less than human?

What is worse? Hitler ordering extermination of Jews due to a personal grudge, or the British purposefully starving millions so that the empire could turn more of a profit? I leave it to you to decide, since I cannot honestly decide. But your attitude is exactly what I am talking about. 58.73 millions killed for profit is excusable as per you, while 6 million killed due to a personal grudge is a huge crime, since it was done by the "evil" Germans, rather than one of the war partners.

I am not saying that holocaust was not a tragedy. But the guy excusing genocide of 58.37 millions... that is the person you are. All so that your childish belief in America "saving the world from evil" can be maintained.

How exactly is starving to death a good way to live? Personally I think dying in ovens/gas is considerably better than dying from starvation (which also happened in German concentration camps). Actually I can't think of many ways to die that are worse than starvation.

North Korea + China once fought South Korea + US to a stand still. Today, they're one of the poorest, malnourished, and isolated countries in the world.

The US isn't going to go to war with NK until it absolutely has to. We're playing a waiting game. Each year that passes NK gets further and further behind. The long they wait, the easier and less risky it is for the US to finish the war.

You really think China will be there to help them? China has had the ability to put a nuclear icbm on any point on the eart

North Korea + China once fought South Korea + US to a stand still. Today, they're one of the poorest, malnourished, and isolated countries in the world.

Meh. It would be more accurate to say that China fought the US to a standstill. The only reasons the North Korean forces had such success early on in the Korean War were (a) near-total surprise, and (b) at that point, both Koreas were about equally poor, malnourished, and isolated. Once the UN (mainly US) war machine really got rolling, North Korea itself crumbled pretty fast, and it took what was essentially a Chinese takeover of the war to push the situation to its eventual stalemate.

You really think China will be there to help them? China has had the ability to put a nuclear icbm on any point on the earth for 30 years. They won't give NK a missile, but you think they'll risk destabilizing their own country for them?

Unfortunately, I think China would make pretty much the same calculation now they did sixty years ago: they may not give a damn about North Korea as such, but they won't tolerate having the US Army camped out on the Yalu.

> Unfortunately, I think China would make pretty much the same calculation now they did sixty years ago: they may not give a damn about North Korea as such, but they won't tolerate having the US Army camped out on the Yalu.

The difference is, there's no way in hell the US will actually threaten China, like they did in the Korean war. General MacArthur genuinely thought they could invade China next. They would have probably won, too.

Now, China will hope the US downgrades its presence in South Korea and Japan. If North Korea goes, so do a lot of US soldiers, which makes it easier for China to throw its weight around the region.

I don't see how we could have possibly beaten China in the early '50s. Even ignoring their shorter supply lines and near-limitless manpower, they were also allied with the Soviets at the time, and our industry had spun down from its war footing in the '40s.

You really think China will be there to help them? China has had the ability to put a nuclear icbm on any point on the earth for 30 years. They won't give NK a missile, but you think they'll risk destabilizing their own country for them?

China could pretty much disable the US economy with sanctions so it wouldn't need to waste any nukes
the US depends on China a lot more than China depends on the US

That's pretty dumb. A 14 trillion $ economy is going to be disabled by a country that trades 400b per YEAR with it? Or do you imagine that the 100b a year we export to US is somehow vital to our economy? Or do you imagine that the debt they hold, that we could freely choose to devalue or refuse to pay, somehow could be called-in by China? (btw, it literally can't be called-in by China. If China wants to get rid of it, they have to find another party to buy it from them.)

The USs biggest strategic weakness is its indebtedness and addiction to consumer goods. Keep thinking deeper about that and you'll come to the realisation about how wars are fought in the 21st century. No country has to start attacking the US physically, they just have to cut off the supply of whatever goodies (electronics, drugs, energy - for now, rare-earths, cheap labour) they supply to american markets and the citizens themselves will force regime change in the United States.

It won't even hurt the supplier as there are now plenty of alternative markets they can fulfill. Relying on a military, to fight for poorly explained causes in places no american has heard of is an increasingly lost cause. Hitting your target in it's soft underbelly is virtually painless, very effective and none of your own people suffer.

Every major economic block in the world would suffer tremendous damage if the US economy really tanked. People were panicking when it looked like Greece would bring down the entire EU financial system. There are neighborhoods in the US that have higher GDP than Greece. When it comes to China they make nothing the US could not get somewhere else. However China has a growing dependency on US food exports that have grown by a factor of 5 over the past 10 years. The US has already re-opened several rare earth extraction sites to avoid total reliance on China. The US represents 30% of China's total export market so they would take a major hit if they lost the US as a customer. China is also starting to face it's own competition when it comes to cheap labour. There are several south west Asian countries that can compete with China in the labor market. The current US energy boom with natural gas and growing oil production is also going to make the US economy stronger over the next 10 years. All of the projections of China's economy passing the US economy has not taken into account the growing US energy export increases. The US public has also started speaking out against anything made in China. (Witness the Olympic uniform manufacturer uproar) Apples latest initiative to start manufacturing some of their product lines in the US is good marketing PR even if the benefits are not as great as some people think in terms of providing new jobs. And by the way the US already undergoes regime change every 4 or 8 years like clockwork. It's not a perfect system but show me a system that is.

China could pretty much disable the US economy with sanctions so it wouldn't need to waste any nukes

Oh wow. You mean that they would practically give the US trillions of dollars with sanctions (in the form of T-Bonds that don't have to be paid back), while fucking over the US but shooting themselves in the head, right?

the US depends on China a lot more than China depends on the US

You've been reading slashdot to much. China is a place where people still starve to death. The US would lose a iPods and cheap shoes (that can be moved to some other shithole in a few years time anyway), and China would lose stuff like.... food.

You are talking about China and North-Korea. BOTH countries have in their recent history not given a fucking shit about how many of their citizens starve. We are not even talking Africa style hunger but MILLIONS dying in a short period of time.

"The North Korean famine, known as the Arduous March (Hangul: Chosn'gl: ) in North Korea, was a famine that occurred in North Korea from 1994 to 1998.[5] Estimates of the death toll vary widely. Out of a total population of approximately 22 million, somewhere between 240,000 and 3,500,000 people died from starvation or hunger-related illnesses, with the deaths peaking in 1997.[6][7]"

"The Dutch famine of 1944, known as the Hongerwinter ("Hunger winter") in Dutch, was a famine that took place in the German-occupied part of the Netherlands, especially in the densely populated western provinces above the great rivers, during the winter of 1944-1945, near the end of World War II. A German blockade cut off food and fuel shipments from farm areas to punish the reluctance of the Dutch to aid the Nazi war effort. Some 4.5 million were affected and survived because of soup kitchens. About 22,000 died because of the famine.[1][2] Most vulnerable according to the death reports were elderly men.[3]"

COMPARE the figures. Granted, Holland was a LOT smaller and the figures are far more accurate but still, when your regime incurs a worse death ratio then the Germans, the most evil country on earth, you are NOT nice people. And your actions won't be affected by the loss of food imports.

The Chinese aren't much better

According to government statistics, there were 15 million excess deaths in this period.[1] Unofficial estimates vary, but scholars have estimated the number of famine victims to be between 20 and 43 million.[2] Historian Frank Dikötter, having been granted special access to Chinese archival materials, estimates that there were at least 45 million premature deaths from 1958 to 1962.[3][4] Chinese journalist Yang Jisheng concluded there were 36 million deaths due to starvation, while another 40 million others failed to be born, so that “China’s total population loss during the Great Famine then comes to 76 million.”[5] The phrase "Three Bitter Years" is often used by Chinese peasants to describe this period.

Now granted, China has a HUGE population but we are talking a death toll equal or even exceeding that of the ENTIRE second world war.

Oh but MODERN China would revolt... why? Old China didn't. People don't revolt when they are hungry, ESPECIALLY when they can see the hunger is happening to THEM, not US. Check history, it is when people have full bellies, that they revolt. Oh, when the revolution has started rolling, the hungry might join in, or be forced to join but it NEVER starts with the hungry. Anyway, all you need is to feed the soldiers and their immediate family. Kill some hungry grumblers and your family eats. It works very well.

No. China and NK have maintained their system long enough to know how to keep it. Make it very clear to the people they got a choice. Live under the system or die under it. A few million deaths from starvation aren't going to chance that.

And the US NEEDS China's toys, because US citizens are NOT close to starvation, their bellies are full and they got more weapons then their own army. The US couldn't afford for Walmart to go out of business because there are no more cheap imports.

But nothing will happen because on both sides, the powers that be WANT to keep their luxury lifestyles. The real risk for war is NOT when the masses have nothing to eat, or to much to eat but when a leader decided that some ideology is more important then luxury. That is the time to get scared.

"The Dutch famine of 1944, known as the Hongerwinter ("Hunger winter") in Dutch, was a famine that took place in the German-occupied part of the Netherlands, especially in the densely populated western provinces above the great rivers, during the winter of 1944-1945, near the end of World War II. A German blockade cut off food and fuel shipments from farm areas to punish the reluctance of the Dutch to aid the Nazi war effort. Some 4.5 million were affected and survived because of soup kitchens. About 22,000 died because of the famine.[1][2] Most vulnerable according to the death reports were elderly men.[3]"

COMPARE the figures. Granted, Holland was a LOT smaller and the figures are far more accurate but still, when your regime incurs a worse death ratio then the Germans, the most evil country on earth, you are NOT nice people. And your actions won't be affected by the loss of food imports.

Pah the Germans were such wimps.

In 1943 the British managed to let somewhere between 1.5 and 4 million people starve to death in Bengal (out of a population of 60.3 million ).

Arguably British reparations could be blamed for world war two. They forced Germany into a place that enabled Hitler to come to power. That is probably the greater evil. Britain played the charlatan and Germany ends up the devil. I completely agree this guy needs to read a history book desperately. Plus the country really isn't that evil it is just very industrious. They accomplish to the best of their abilities what they put their sights on.

When you are willing to let your people starve and work them as slave labor, then kill them, sanctions doesn't really matter. What is the saying, I don't care about money, give me minions. This will continue until China steps in or the country revolts, which due to the level of imprisonment, propaganda, force, and international apathy is unlikely. Think about it. Who will be responsible to clean up the mess if the country falls? China? The US? Its easier to just let them be.

that's only because Australia doesn't have a nuclear power generating capacity - because they don't want it. Yet. Although, with 40% of the world's known uranium reserves in its dirt, one could hardly blame them for being willing to part with it at what other consider to be bargain basement prices... one man's shit, etc. That'll change if Resources Minister Martin Ferguson gets his way, but even he's still nervous after Fukushima. "The Australian government's responsibility is to test all forms of clean ene

As much as the man on the street tries to maintain the dream of a unified Korea, the people who would actually have to coordinate unification balk at the unimaginable burden rebuilding the North would represent. Even Germany had a hard time absorbing the East. At the time a) West Germany was wealthier than South Korea and b) East Germany was in a lot better shape than North Korea.

So South Korea and China will continue to send enough aid that they don't have millions of refugees flooding over the border.

It would cost SK trillions, and while it would certainly gain the benefits of NK's technical expertise surrounding certain types of weaponry, I think it would probably do SK severe damage. I don't think you could do a German style reunification. Maybe a stages approach, but that would pretty much mean the Kims and the senior military brass would have to be out of the picture, and as we've seen, the Kim's are very very good at keeping their power base intact.

It is not friendly and not a good neighbour, but there are no US bases there, so the Chinese government probably still prefers it to a unified Korea for that reason. Mao played all kinds of odd mind games on the first Kim (eg. fabricating "evidence" of a US biological weapons attack on NK and convincing Kim that it was real), then a couple of decades ago there was an attempted coup in NK with apparent Chinese involvement and the border has been almost closed since then.

That has already happened on several occasions, and it was a bit of a headache each time. I don't know what the refugee situation is now but apparently just before 2000 there were thousands in camps in the province of Jilin.

While it is still unconfirmed as to whether or not North Korea actually put a satellite into orbit, it seems clean that sanctions have failed to curb North Korea's quest for more powerful weaponry."

No kidding? Because I figured that cutting them off would strangle their weapons programs and starve out the current government. Why, it almost seems as of the economic sanctions only hurt the hoi polloi, and that the leaders kept what little resources there were for themselves and let the rest of the country go hungry. What a completely odd and unpredictable event!

Even if all they put into orbit is dead weight, it's hard not to be at least a little excited about it. In the face of idiotic domestic policy, sanctions, and enemies on all sides they've managed to build a multi-stage rocket and put something into orbit with it.

You are in Obama's war room, you suggest:
A) Just Nuke Em and get it over with!
B) Send in the drones after Kim Jong-un
C) We need more sanctions.
D) Screw the budget gap; we need more military spending!
E) Other?

I dug through Wikipedia and found that Sputnik weight a whooping 87kg...all Nuclear Bombs of that time (could not find a reference to a real warhead for mounting on a missile) were a little bit...uuuhhh...bigger, with more than 1ton each (a bomb from 1961 weight in at 27tons)...so, you got some reference to back that claim up?

More likely the fun of autocorrect got you, I don't know how many times I got texts from customers where I go "WTH does this mean?" for them to go "That wasn't what I was trying to type!". You should check out the website devoted to it some time there are some hilarious bloopers on there. I like the one where the mom texted her teen daughter to ask what she was gonna do for the weekend and the text came back "I'm gonna get pregnant" which naturally caused the mom to flip her shit until the daughter texted back she was trying to type pringles and got bit by autocorrect.

As for TFA? Meh, not really worried too much about NK. I have a feeling that if it looks like they are getting ready to roll the tanks rather than have a hot and possibly nuclear war in their backyard the Chinese will drop the hammer on their asses, and considering most of the stuff NK uses is based on 60s and 70s Soviet tech I really doubt they are gonna get much in the way of accuracy on these things. If anybody should be worried its Japan as having cheap NK junk falling in their backyard could be a problem but SK has one of the most modern military forces on the planet so I kinda doubt NK is gonna be stupid enough to try a full blown restart of the Korean war.

More likely this is more weenie waving by NK so they don't look so weak compared to their neighbors and so they can get more aid, that's all. Its pretty common knowledge that Juce is a failure, their economy is a bad joke, and if it weren't for aid the whole thing would fall down, so most likely this is just another attempt to extort more aid to prop the place up. Frankly I'm shocked after "dear leader" bought the farm that they let the kid take over, frankly right up until it was certain daddy wasn't gonna make it nobody had even heard of the kid, so I have to wonder if he isn't just a puppet told to STFU and stand there while the generals really run the show.